PSR600 vs BCD996T The verdict is in.

[davidmc36]

Have owned the 996 for a couple years or so and Got the 600 a couple of weeks ago.

Interfacing to PC: From the start of driver installation to seeing scanner VC on screen was about two minutes for the GRE and twice as long for the UNIDEN; both acceptable.

Speaker Sound Quality:Both are top 20% products with an edge to the 600 since the 996 has a bit too much bass and makes it just slightly muffled.

Memory Space: Both have much more than I need to cover the rural area I am in the most. If I took a mind to put in everything that I may encounter while in the downtown area both would be full and then some, so the edge goes to GRE with the ability to carry V-Folders right in the radio.

Key-Pad Programming:No contest, OOI wins hands down. I pulled it out of the box and have only looked at the manual a handful of times for the location of a certain setting, or to determine what a setting is for that I stumbled across while keying through the menus.

GPS Capability:Obviously not able to apply a fair comparison on this point, but Uniden's inclusion of it makes the 996 the only choice for me for a mobile scanner. But points must be given to GRE for the highly customizable "Roam" setting for multi-site systems. For many cases this would provide rotating coverage that would reasonably simulate GPS Location Based, and in certain situations could provide more relevant coverage when traveling in areas of fluctuating signal strengths.

Software: There's lots of choices for both models and all have their + and -, that's whole different discussion.

Radio ID's ETC.:Not relevant to the 996 since you can't be gawking around at what is happening on the display while mobile, so who cares it does not have them. At home with the GRE, I have T88 and other programs that can show me all I might want to know about CC Data.

For me, the rest of the comparisons that get tossed around, like which display is better or who has better alerts, are just a lot of fluff. Cool features but not relevant to quality of reception or ease of use.

By no means an exhaustive review, just a few significant observations.

 

[WX4JCW]

Cool, Thanks will be interesting to see how the 600 Stacks up against a 996XT as well

 

[N9JIG]

While everyone will draw their own conclusions of course, I have both the PSR600 and 996T as well as 996XT. Out of all, the 996XT winds on most counts for me.

The PSR600 has the better audio, especially on digital simulcast systems, but the XT cuts the advantage quite a bit.

While some people really like the OOUI, I have leaned toward the Uniden System/Group arrangement. This might just be more to that I spent more time with the Unidens due to the other features, the more time I spend playing with theGRE the more I tend to understand and appreciate it.

What really wins me over for the Unidens however are the feature set. Now that the XT has UserID's, it really shines for me. I use the FTO and GPS features extensively, and can not live without the RH-96 in my mobile installation.

 

[kayi4cle]

I guess I'm the only one who likes the 996T audio better (compared to a Pro-197). A little more bass and a little less treble is much easier on my ears, and it has a fuller, deeper sound. It's just a matter of personal preference, and I like music with more bass also. Just my two cents . . .

 

[davidmc36]

Have owned the 996 for a couple years or so and Got the 600 a couple of weeks ago.

Interfacing to PC: From the start of driver installation to seeing scanner VC on screen was about two minutes for the GRE and twice as long for the UNIDEN; both acceptable.

Speaker Sound Quality:Both are top 20% products with an edge to the 600 since the 996 has a bit too much bass and makes it just slightly muffled.

Memory Space: Both have much more than I need to cover the rural area I am in the most. If I took a mind to put in everything that I may encounter while in the downtown area both would be full and then some, so the edge goes to GRE with the ability to carry V-Folders right in the radio.

Key-Pad Programming:No contest, OOI wins hands down. I pulled it out of the box and have only looked at the manual a handful of times for the location of a certain setting, or to determine what a setting is for that I stumbled across while keying through the menus.

GPS Capability:Obviously not able to apply a fair comparison on this point, but Uniden's inclusion of it makes the 996 the only choice for me for a mobile scanner. But points must be given to GRE for the highly customizable "Roam" setting for multi-site systems. For many cases this would provide rotating coverage that would reasonably simulate GPS Location Based, and in certain situations could provide more relevant coverage when traveling in areas of fluctuating signal strengths.

Software: There's lots of choices for both models and all have their + and -, that's whole different discussion.

Radio ID's ETC.:Not relevant to the 996 since you can't be gawking around at what is happening on the display while mobile, so who cares it does not have them. At home with the GRE, I have T88 and other programs that can show me all I might want to know about CC Data.

For me, the rest of the comparisons that get tossed around, like which display is better or who has better alerts, are just a lot of fluff. Cool features but not relevant to quality of reception or ease of use.

By no means an exhaustive review, just a few significant observations.

Meant to include:

800 MHZ: GRE outperforms all of my Uniden's in the 800 MHZ range. Works well for rural area but have heard much about it being too sensitive in congested areas.

 

[N9JIG]

Meant to include:

800 MHZ: GRE outperforms all of my Uniden's in the 800 MHZ range. Works well for rural area but have heard much about it being too sensitive in congested areas.

I have found that to be the case. I live in a suburban area halfway between Chicago and Milwaukee and I visit both cities regularly. While my Unidens are the primary car scanners for me these days, I have had the full range of GRE products running for various projects and have found that the closer I get to either city the GRE's start going into noise mode while the Uniden's remain receiving as usual.

Conversely the further I get away from the cities, like when I am railfanning in western IL or heading up to the UP, the GRE's are more sensitive than the Uniden's. Around my home however the distinction gets muddled since I am far enough away from the city to not have too much problem with the GRE and too close to give advantage to the Uniden...

Reception wise it really appears to me that the Unidens have a big edge on selectivity while the GRE's have the edge on Sensitivity. This appears over the whole range of current scanners, as I have found this to be true on the whole range of Uniden and GRE scanners. I have at least one of each of the current line of both companies products and it reamins very consistent. It also seems to be consistent across the bands, on VHF, UHF and 800.

Another thing I have found these days is less variance between radios of the same model. I used to have a few PRO2006's or a couple BC760's and one would seem to be more sensitive or more selective than the next of the same model. The current generation of scanners seem to be much more consistent, of my 7 BC15's for example, not one seems to be much better or worse than the next. Same thing for my 2 PSR600's.

 

[gmclam]

Meant to include:

800 MHZ: GRE outperforms all of my Uniden's in the 800 MHZ range. Works well for rural area but have heard much about it being too sensitive in congested areas.

I could care less about most of the other stuff. This IS the thing that matters to me most. If I can't hear, the scanner, and all the bells and whistles, are useless.

Yeah yeah I know there are a lot of people that complain about front end overload with GREs. Is that with a rubber antenna? If not, you can add filters/etc externally to mitigate the problem. In the case of Unidens, you'd have to add an amplifier to make them hear better, and then typically you are worse off than with a stock GRE.